Wheeling Sunday register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1882-1934, 1887-12-04
DEVIL MACK.
A FREIGHT ENGINEER WHO KILLED 0BJBC.
TIONABLE BRAKEMEN.
How Hs Murdered bis Daughters Sweetheart and
Lost his Reason.

have twisted brakes on eight roads and
been in as many more accidents, yet here
| am almost all right. Ny worst expert
ence? Well, that's easy. Ii was on the
Chesapeake and Ohio Road a few years ago,
while | was running on a through freight
from Hinton to Coal Valley. What a
beautiful country that valley Of the New
river is. Now your train is buried in a
tunnel hewn from the solid rock, aud il
eplerges to skim along a bracket-like side
cut of q precipice's front, where the rock
iuts out overhead. Down beneath You a
tipy, thread-like stream tumbles over the
rocks, loses itself in the deep pools, some
of which, like the blue hole from which
the tunnel near it gets its name, has, it Is
said, no bottom, and none has ever been
found hy sounding. The mountains are
majestic, their heads towering, like giants
who nod 10 the moonlight to each other
across the little stream, for there is no val
lev between. 1t was upthat road that lost a
finger aud had my arm broken, the only
0GlAUC0I L udNS tNCl SuNVhLNSANAs
the road was built an old Scotch engineer,
let us call him Mcintosh, was the first en-
gineer employed. He had the reputation
| OF ecceutricity, and began TO sustain 1t by
killing and Gripping his brakemen. He
would whistle and slow up for a dog,
| throw his lever over to keep from killing a
cow, but when he felt ugly he would kill
a brakeman without losing a breath.
When | went on the road, five years ago.
he had acquired the nam OF Devil Mac"
and the Man Killer everywhere, aud
| the trainmaster had hard work to get q
crew when Mac was in the engine. he
had a fine locomotive, and could pull as
| DIG q train up the New rive grades as any
man. He had killed, it was said, On even
dozen men when / was put OF the crew OF
Bob jenkins, as brave a conductor as you
ever heard OF.
Mac was engineer and one day during
one OF the fights at a station by the way,
Jenkins would stop his train 10 fight a
man I incurred Macs i'll will By accident
ally knocking down an old friend Of his
He had it in for me and when We made q
stop would give me lots Of trouble. l was
front brakeman then and tended to
switches and couplings. Mac had seem
| insly reformed as he had made no breaks
for some tome, and Jenkins cried ont in
horror when he saw me narrowly escape
being crushed by a sudden crash of the
cars while making a coupling. Macs
after you" be said. Then be told me what
to do and the old demons plan. When
Mac wanted to kill a man he would wait
till he had been making q coupling. Then
he would stop Just near the place or come
hack too hard, till he got the brakeman
ratified, and finally the man would stay in
to put the pin down. Mac would come
back slowly till he thought he had his
victim, and then with a fiendish laugh and
q full head be would send his engine back
and four times out Of five would kill or
main his man. / was naturally scared but
tried to do my work as usual He caught
me once, but it was only a bruise- As /
hobbled into the caboose Jenkins put q
"A revolver in my hand and said: "If he
cripples you, kill him" / only needed a
few hours rest and was able to work back
with my crew. Mac was anxious TO get
home and the way be kept his engine puff